The Great Depression: Hitler becomes German chancellor

Summary

In Germany towards the end of 1929 employment melted away so rapidly that the prosperous period seemed to have been a mere illusion. In Austria the prosperity had been less convincing in any case, and soon the streets of Vienna seemed crowded with beggars. The Socialist Chancellor of Germany, Hermann Müller, resigned, and Hindenburg called upon the leader of the Centre party, Heinrich Brüning, to succeed him in the spring of 1930. Behind Brüning, and far more than he ever realised, intrigues were concentrating upon plans to make Hindenburg more of a pre-1914 emperor, and to reduce the powers of the Reichstag accordingly: these intrigues emanated from a ‘political general’ called Kurt von Schleicher, a friend of the President's son Oscar. When in July 1930 Brüning failed to get the agreement of the Reichstag to some deflationary measures of his, Hindenburg, encouraged by Schleicher, enforced them by emergency decree. Brüning thought it correct to dissolve the Reichstag, which had been elected in May 1928 in the prosperous period.

Elections were held on 14 September 1930: the results were like a bombshell for Germany and for Europe. The number of Communist deputies increased from 54 to 77 and the National Socialist Party (Nazis) shot up from 12 in the last Reichstag to 107: they were now the largest party after the Social Democrats. These Nazis were the followers of the Austrian agitator, Adolf Hitler, who had ignominiously failed to seize power in Munich in November 1923.